There was the mouth of the river, reduced in summer to little more than a ditch, sluicing a path for itself through the mud and sand.

"Keep this side of it," Ramage said quietly. "That'll save us crossing the bridge."

"Aye, bridges could mean sentries," Jackson commented, as though talking to himself. "Not that Boney would think much of this bridge."

In the darkness Ramage could see the faint white crests of the wavelets curling over on the sand, leaving a narrow line of white froth. Jackson gave an order to the oarsmen, and the boat slowed.

Ramage called to Martin, who was sitting in the bow, and the youth began scrambling aft over the thwarts. He would be in charge of the three boats once the Pitigliano party was safe on the beach and they could return to the frigate. It was all right for the Calypso to be openly anchored in the bay, but her boats must be hoisted on board: the French must not have any idea that she had landed men.

"Hold tight," Jackson warned as the gig's stem scraped on the sand. "Grapplers over the side!"

"Grapplers" was Jackson's word for the four men who leapt into the water and, standing waist-deep, stopped the boat slewing and then helped pull it further up the beach so that the men who were landing would not get so wet.

"She's all yours, Martin," Ramage said and, gripping the bulwark, lowered himself into the water. It was warmer than he expected, and he teased himself that once again he was caught: frequently on what seemed a cold night in the Tropics it would feel warmer in the water than out - and frequently it was: the sea would be 80° while the air was 76°. Of course even a slight breeze made it seem chillier, in the same way that putting milk or butter in a pottery dish covered with muslin soaking up water kept everything cool by evaporation.

Now the men of the landing party were leaving the boat, first scrambling barefooted over the side into the water and running a few paces up the beach to put their boots in a dry place, then returning to the boat for pistols, muskets and swords.

A few yards to larboard the cutter grounded, and a couple of moments later the jolly-boat nosed up to starboard. Ramage, having put his boots under a bush, went back to the boat to collect his sword and brace of pistols.

He counted the men in his party: they were all waiting on the sandy beach. He gestured to the "grapplers" and called to Martin: "Right, now you can be on your way. Make sure the other two boats follow." With that he helped the "grapplers" push the boat out, giving it a final thrust as they swung up over the bulwarks and wriggled back on to the thwarts. "Good luck, sir," the nearest man whispered, "wish I was coming with you." Finally the beach was clear of boats and the three groups of men were among the pine trees, except for two who, under Jackson's guidance, had cut branches from the bushes and, using them as brooms, were sweeping the sand to hide the many footprints. The rise and fall of the tide was only a few inches (leading poets and others to assume the Mediterranean was in fact tideless) but it was still rising and would soon smooth out the three grooves made by the stems of the boats. Half a day's sun and some wind whiffling along the beach would have the sand completely smooth again, except for the lace-like foot prints left by the wading birds that strutted along the shoreline pecking up their food.

Ramage found a small and stubby bush without thorns to squat down on as he pulled on his boots, leaving his sword and pistols on the next bush: bitter experience had taught him that a mere hint of sand was enough to cover a uniform, make a sword grate as it was pulled from its scabbard, and block the touchhole of a pistol.

Hill came up in the darkness to report. "My party's ready, sir. The prisoners are ready with Mr Aitken and Rennick . . ."

Ramage grunted as he gave the last boot a tug and then stood up. "No packs of barking dogs or squadrons of French cavalry patrols yet, eh?"

"You can't trust these foreigners to be punctual, sir," Hill said mildly. "Shall I get my party up to the road?"

"Yes, cross to the other side, and tell Mr Aitken to follow you."

He stood for a couple of minutes, staring seaward and breathing in all the scents that made Italy. Over there, the black shape blotting out the stars behind it was Argentario, and to his left he could make out the curving causeway, the Tombolo della Giannella. What was the southern one called? Yes, of course: the Tombolo di Feniglia, which swept round to Port' Ercole. The pine trees of Giannella at the back of the halfmoon of beach (scimitar shaped, really, considering its length) were black, almost menacing. He could pick out the peak of Monte Argentario, but the shadows were too distorting to be able to sight Santo Stefano. No lights visible at this distance - no lights anyway, in all probability: men who rose with the sun to farm their strips of land and tend the grapevines on the terraces went to bed with the sun.

The occasional quark of the nightjar ... the insects ... a splash a few yards out to sea as a small fish leapt in a frantic attempt to escape a predator. When did a fish rest? Dare it ever? How could it stop motionless, knowing that at any moment it might be gobbled up by its next largest neighbour? It must be like that if you belonged to a country close to France . . . Genoa, Switzerland, Lombardy, Piedmont, Venice, Tuscany, the Papal States, the Netherlands . . . the minnows of Europe had been gobbled up, one by one, in the last dozen years.

"Mr Aitken's compliments, sir," Jackson muttered apologetically, knowing the captain's memory was slipping back over the years, and unwilling to break in on his thoughts, "but his and Mr Hill's party are waiting on the other side of the road now, alongside a row of cypress. He wants to know if the prisoners with Mr Rennick should put on their irons."

Ramage glanced up at the sky. From the position of the stars it must be about midnight. Strange, seeing the Pole Star so high after the years in the Tropics, where it was usually less than a dozen degrees above the horizon. If you know the altitude of the Pole Star you know your latitude - that must be about the first thing a midshipman learned when he began navigation. Well, he was standing at about forty-two degrees thirty minutes North, and since that was his latitude it was also the altitude of the Pole Star.

"My compliments to Mr Aitken: I'll be with him in a moment. Lead our party over to join him."

An hour later Ramage and his men were resting a mile along the road to Pitigliano. Most were asleep beside another cypress grove which had been planted more than a century earlier as a windbreak for a farmhouse long ago deserted. The roof was falling in, the last of the whitewash flaking off the walls, the doors either hung by the remains of a single hinge or were lying flat on the ground, a shelter for scorpions hiding underneath among pebbles and in grass growing white. Ramage had warned the men against the small, black scorpion which was ready in an instant to bring up its tail in an arc over its body to jab with the sting at the end.

One of the "prisoners" sat against a tree-trunk, acting as sentry, and at his feet was the canvas bag containing all the arm irons that could be found on board the Calypso. Fortunately, there were just enough to shackle the "prisoners" together when the time came to march.

Ramage sat against another cypress, alone with his thoughts and vaguely conscious that a surprising number of the men snored very loudly. Even more surprising, he thought, was the fact that most of them seemed to find the hard ground as comfortable as a down-filled mattress.

Yes, he could just see Gold Belt, low on the horizon. Strange after all the months in the Tropics when those stars passed high to the south, often overhead.